Making Mobile Marketing Magnificent

It’s quite amazing how much human behavior has changed over the past two decades when it comes to mobile devices. Simply doing a little people watching while at your local mall or at a restaurant will give you a good idea of just how much modern generations are using their mobile devices in any and all situations.

Statistics from Smart Insights point out that there are over 1.6 billion mobile device users in the world today and that the average time spent on mobile devices turns out to be an astonishing average of 2.8 hours a day in the year 2015. Maybe even more surprising is that the hourly usage has been steadily rising and was only .8 hours per day as recent as 2011.

With the increase in mobile device usage being so dramatic, it is no wonder that so many content marketers and brands are jumping on the bandwagon and doing everything in their power to improve their mobile marketing efforts.

Let’s take a look at a few ways that you can make your content mobile marketing strategy magnificent:

Integrate Your Content & Mobile Website with Social Media

If you aren’t integrating your content with social media, you are way behind the eight ball. Social media allows you to do so many things to grow your content marketing efforts that it should be a crime to not focus a majority of your efforts on the potential that sites like Twitter, Facebook, Pinterest, and Instagram offer.

One of the best ways to utilize social media sites when integrated is by allowing your readers and customers to express themselves through your content or products. Jeff Rajeck at Econsultancy points out that, in many cases, an individual’s mobile phone is their only ‘personal’ computer. Therefore, mobile efforts offer a much more personalized approach to our readers.

The Share-a-Coke-selfie campaign that Coca-Cola recently did is a great example of how you can utilize social media to increase recognition around your content and brand. Other than marketing campaigns, producing high quality content on a regular basis will also yield a great deal of free marketing through social media likes, shares, and pins.

Understand Your Readers and Their Habits

No matter what type of marketing strategy you’re looking to create, it is imperative that you understand your readers and their habits. Developing an understanding of the behaviors of your target market can allow you to customize the experience to meet their unique desires and needs.

As Jeff Pasen, author of Mobilized Marketing, mentions, “This is the age of choice. People communicate the way they want to.” Realizing that this is the reality of modern day mobile marketing should make you much keener to researching and developing a stronger understanding of what your readers want.

Testing different tactics has and always will be the most effective way to find out whether a marketing strategy works or not. Don’t be afraid to try different opt-in and social media tactics to see which one works best for you.

While it is essential to understand your readers and their habits, John Arnold, a marketing consultant, says that we want to be sure that our marketing methods do not feature what he calls “too much targeting.” He insists that you should utilize “just enough targeting”, such as targeting everyone with an iPhone or everyone with a Blackberry.

Utilize Video Marketing on Mobile Devices

A study completed by Nielson pointed out that over 28% of all online consumers watch some type of video on their mobile device at least once per day. While some content marketers may be a bit uneasy about the thought of creating videos for their audience, the short attention span of modern consumers means that videos only have to be short 5-15 second clips to be effective.

Instagram and Vine provide an easy way for content marketers to create short videos while also reaching a wider audience in the process. This also provides an opportunity for consumers to get a better idea of exactly who you are, which is always an effective way of building trust with your readers.

Develop a Plan Specifically for Mobile Marketing

It is astonishing how many content marketers will make an attempt to break into mobile marketing without developing an actual plan for doing so. Regalix, a digital based company, did a study in January 2015 that found that only about 20% of content marketers have an exclusive mobile marketing strategy that they follow. This means that 4 out of 5 content marketers have absolutely no plan associated with their mobile marketing efforts.

While these statistics are surprising, it certainly presents the opportunity for you and your brand to get ahead of the game by developing a productive mobile marketing strategy. If you are unsure about the process, Jennifer Wong from HasOffers lays out a step-by-step guide for getting your campaign together.

One of the main reasons that developing a plan is so necessary to mobile marketing success is because it is the only way to know exactly what the purpose of your campaign or strategy is. Simply stating that you would like to “gain a larger audience” or “grow your email list” is not going to cut it. You need to get specific about exactly what you want so you can get specific about how you are going to achieve it.

Conclusion

At the end of the day, creating a magnificent mobile marketing strategy comes down to understanding what you want to do and developing a plan for how you are going to do it. Integrating social media, understanding your target market, and utilizing video are all great tactics to help you along the way. However, nothing will be more important to your success than knowing what you want to get out of your campaign.

Who knows, with the lack of content marketers creating a plan for their mobile marketing strategies, you may be able to build an audience faster than you ever expected. Good luck!